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Romans 1 Paul Defines the Good News

Posted by adventbiblestudy on July 25, 2013

Romans 1:1-5 NLTse This letter is from Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, chosen by God to be an apostle and sent out to preach his Good News. (2) God promised this Good News long agothrough his prophets in the holy Scriptures. (3) The Good News is about his Son, Jesus. In his earthly life he was born into King David’s family line, (4) and he was shown to be the Son of God when he was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit. He is Jesus Christ our Lord. (5) Through Christ, God has given us the privilege and authority as apostles to tell Gentiles everywhere what God has done for them, so that they will believe and obey him, bringing glory to his name.

In the beginning of his letters, Paul identifies the message he was given to teach. He called it the GOOD NEWS. It is about Jesus and His life here. It is about showing, Jesus is God’s Son. Nothing more. Nothing less. Why don’t the churches know this message in the last days?

Romans 1:19-22 NLTse They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. (20) For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God. (21) Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused. (22) Claiming to be wise, they instead became utter fools.

This includes everything. All the doctrines and traditions men made up to replace the simple message of the GOOD NEWS. In their fight to make themselves look better than the churches down the street they lost the original message Jesus gave them to teach. Paul tells us when this will come to its height. When the message will be forgotten. Paul set the time through symbols.

Romans 1:23-25 NLTse And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles. (24) So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. (25) They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen.

Paul points to the man made concept of evolution. This is a concept that is obviously wrong. But put this into context. Who was this letter written to? Was it for believers or nonbelievers? It was written to believers so they could see the signs of the times when believers trade lies for the truth. When believers forget the simple message. When they forget what the GOOD NEWS is.

Romans 1:26-28 NLTse That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. (27) And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved. (28) Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done.

Another sign is the world wide gay movement and its acceptance by the world. It is a sign we see in our lives today. People can take this two ways. They can take this information, twist it in their own minds and replace the GOOD NEWS with a warning. Or they can see the warning, recognize the time and search to find the GOOD NEWS so they can effectively teach it. They can accept the message from Heaven, or turn to the world for answers. When the choose to study the message of the world: Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too. (Romans 1:29-32 NLTse).